Needing help optimizing a control Warlock

[Crzygeoff89]

I am a Level 3 Tome Warlock and wanting to focus on control. My Patron is Great Old One

Cantrips: Eldritch Blast and Minor Illusion.

Spells: Tasha's Hideous Laugh, Suggestion , Cloud of Daggers, Invisibility

Invocation: Book of Ancient Secrets and Repelling Blast

My Tome Feature Cantrips: Thorn Whip, Guidance, and 1 more I'm unsure of.

In my group I have a Wizard, Sorcerer, Druid, Bard and a Barbarian. I feel I have the battlefield control covered, just trying to balance out the rest so I don't have a bunch of stuff that overlaps.

I'm also not sure what ritual spells to take fro my book of ancient secrets

[Jerrykhor]

I'd advice you to leave the battlefield control to the Wizard and Bard, and probably druid, they do it far better than Warlocks. Your party is very magic heavy, you already have all the full caster classes except Cleric.

I'm not sure why you'd pick Pact of the Tome, Wizard and Druid would cover any ritual casting needs. Whatever ritual you pick would depend on whether those 2 already have them or not, so just pick something they don't have.

For spell choices, Tasha's and Suggestion are not bad spells, but they don't scale to spell slot level. Warlocks always upcast any spell, so I would suggest Hold Person.

If you want to optimise for your party, just take Hex and Agonizing Blast and bring the pain.

[Kane0]

Good control spells:

Arms of Hadar
Hideous Laughter
Phantasmal Force
Crown of Madness
Hold Person
Fear
Black Tentacles
Hunger of Hadar

If you have eldritch blast you have ranged damage pretty much covered, it couples with Hex very well.
Guidance and either Booming blade, Greenflame Blade or Sheleighleigh are good cantrips to pick, as is sacred flame/sword burst/shocking grasp for a backup damage cantrip.

Good rituals to grab:
Comprehend languages
DDetect Magic
Find Familiar
Unseen Servant
Augury
Tiny Hut
Phantom Steed
Water Breathing
Water Walk
Divination
Commune
Telepathic Bond

You will probably want to support the barbarian with as much damage as possible, and the other casters with spells that supplement their own. The druid might shapeshift for melee combat.

[Asmotherion]

A good 3rd cantrip for your tome would be Shillelagh, to get a Quarterstuff, and take the PAM+Sentinel feat progression. It will give you a very good control option when in melee. Add War Caster to your repertoir too eventually, to use it with Scag Cantrips.

[NecroDancer]

For control a chain lock might be better as they can use the help actions and go invisible to mess with enemies.

Get the invocation "mire the mind" so you can cast slow once per day (really good for battle field control).

[CaptainSarathai]

Yeah, Warlocks really aren't naturally gifted Control characters. They're more like Arcane Strikers. They move around the battlefield and apply pain where it helps most.
In fact, they're really a horribly designed class from the very outset. Their spell list isn't that great in combat, and doesn't jive well with their "few slots, auto-scaling" mechanic. Sure, they're very fluffy and lots of fun when role-playing, in that Lovecrsftian "I'll mess with your brain" sort of way, but that's all just fluff. In combat they are 100% about the Hex, Agonizing, Repelling Eldritch Blasts.

Now, I did make a kind of tank, sticky, punisher type Warlock, but that's because I built a Battlemaster Fighter and multiclassed Warlock over top of that. My Warlock levels don't really let me do anything that my Sentinel Fighter couldn't do, except throw Armor of Agathys and Hellish Rebuketo punish enemies for hitting me as well as hitting my allies, and the opportunity to use Booming Blade and Warcaster if the enemy tries to run away.